Psst! She Reads Trashy Novels...

November 03, 2005

Review: Addicted by Zane

Thanks to Nervous, I was raring to get my hands on another novel by Zane. After all the good things I'd heard about Addicted I figured it would be even better than Nervous. I was wrong.

Don't misunderestimate me, I still read that book cover-to-cover in one sitting - it was more addictive than a bag of salt and vinegar potato chips, or those crunchy, spicy Cheetos, which, I swear, must be fortified with your daily USDA recommended allotment of crack, because no sooner do I open a bag than they're gone and I find myself sitting on my couch sucking the last bits of orange powder out from under my fingernails.

But my disgusting junkfood habits aside, this book just wasn't as good. It was like regular Cheetos, instead of extra spicy, and it weighed me down when I was through. I tried to figure out the difference between the two books, and all I could come up with was guilt. Not my guilt - trashy novels are calorie free - but the characters' guilt.

The main character and narrator is Zoe, a beautiful, successful mother of three with a thriving career and a seemingly perfect marriage. But sexfiend Zoe's beloved husband and childhood sweethart, Jason, has never satisfied her in bed. So all of a sudden, Zoe cracks and embarks on a series of affairs with three people who all just happen to be batshit crazy. Zoe feels terrible about cheating, but she is addicted and therefore can't help herself.

And therein lies the difference between Nervous and Addicted. Where Nervous's Jude was an unrepentant nymphomaniac hedonist bitch, Addicted's Zoe is just a sad, guilty little addict - not unlike yours truly after a spicy Cheeto binge. Added to that is the way the book punishes Zoe for her sins. Just when you think she's done been punished enough for three cheating sex addicts, the book heaps more shit on her head. I don't know about you, but suffering isn't my thing. While I relish the soapoperatic plot twists of Addicted, I could do without the downer attitude.

The other thing I didn't like about this book was the ambivalent-to-negative attitude toward lesbian experimentation. This may sound weird coming from me since girl-on-girl action isn't my thing, but it seems like Zane threw a female into the three-bean salad of Zoe's lovers just for titillation (I admit it: pun intended). Where Zoe recounts her interactions with her male lovers in intimate detail, her foray into same-team play comes as an after-the-fact, lite-on-the-details mention, and is bordered by protestations of how she just doesn't like girls. Everyone has a right to their likes and dislikes, but from a plotting standpoint, if you aren't going to respect the Lesbians or the bi girls, why invite them in to play? That's just not polite.

The writing in this book was, as I noted in my review of Nervous spare but effective. Zane doesn't waste a lot of time on flowery descriptions, but her to-the-point prose sets the stage and sketches the characters well enough to tell a good yarn. The characters aren't especially deep, but, hey, this isn't Dickens. I just appreciate that their dialog is so natural.

Which brings me to Zane's greatest contribution to her field: style. As with Nervous, her language is contemporary and never awkward. She uses words that you hear every day - some of which may offend the faint of heart. But if you're faint of heart, why the hell are you reading Zane? - and she uses them to good effect.

Writing dirty is a tightrope walk with "silly" on one side and "sleazy" on the other. Zane skips along that thin divide like one of those twisty little Québécois chicks from Cirque du Soleil. She brings the heat without devolving into sleaze or camp. Zane makes writing good smut look easy.

As I said earlier, this book is a great read, and, like it's title, addictive. I didn't like it as much as Nervous, but then, maybe I'll always have a soft spot in my heart for my first Zane novel.

Posted by sk :: 11/03/2005 :: 0 comments

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